MORE INDULGENT THAN YOU THINK!Samantha Hughes . Nottingham Evening Post - 26 February 2008 
 When Elsa Bua baked some cakes for a festival stall, she did not expect it to be the beginning of a business venture.
But Elsa's vegan cakes have proved more popular than she had imagined.
Now Elsa, 26, from Sneinton, has a growing vegan cake business, interestingly named Pop My Cherry.
Tucking into her soup at vegetarian eatery Alley Cafe Bar and talking about how her business began, Elsa said: "It started when I did 80 cakes for Arboretum Festival.
"It was rained off so I went round businesses to sell the cakes.
"Broadway kept asking me to bring in more, and that's how it all started - more and more businesses kept asking me."
Elsa moved to Nottingham from Sicily in 2000 when she started her degree at Nottingham Trent University.
Pop My Cherry got off the ground last September, and currently provides two Nottingham businesses with vegan cakes and cup-cakes, but Elsa is ready to expand her reach.
Elsa supplies The Broadway and Lee Rosy's Tea, but has had offers of business from across Nottingham.
She said: "I'm just about to move into my own space because I've been sharing a kitchen.
"I'm really excited about moving in.
"At the moment I've only got two clients because I've not got the storage facilities in the kitchen I'm currently in.
"I'm hoping to expand the business - I've been round businesses in Nottingham and there's definitely an interest but I can't take them up until I've got more storage space.
"If I've got the storage then I can go wholesale."
The new kitchen will be rented to Elsa by Iona School in Sneinton, and she plans to have a big champagne and cake opening night once she is settled in.
Big sellers are chilli-chocolate cup-cakes, and traditional favourite carrot cake.
Elsa said: "I tailor-make cakes for each business.
"There's a real niche in the market.
"It would be nice if all businesses had a vegan option, but my cakes sell mainly to non-vegans anyway.
"The business is called Pop My Cherry as it's about new experiences and getting people to try vegan food and not see the word 'vegan' as a negative thing."
Elsa was a strict vegan until last year when she joined a circus training course in Sheffield, where she lived communally and her dietary needs were not catered for.
She still buys and eats vegan food whenever possible, but will eat non-vegan products if there is no suitable alternative.
Talking about her products, Elsa said: "I try and use the most sustainable ingredients.
"I make cruelty-free cakes by not using animal products.
"They taste just as good, so why not use cruelty-free products?
"Becoming a vegan is also the best thing you can do to help climate change, which many people don't realise."
Helping the environment is another of Elsa's concerns, so she delivers all her cakes on her bicycle.
As part of her expansion plans she hopes to buy a specially-made cup-cake holder to help her transport the cup-cakes on her bike without spoiling them.
Elsa, who currently bakes all her cakes and cup-cakes single-handedly, said: "I'm planning to employ someone when the business expands because I don't want it to be my full-time work.
"I'm a community artist, an activist and a performer as well.
"I try and split up the week - I'm very aware not to let one thing take over the other.
"I'm limiting cakes to a maximum of three days a week and I will employ someone else to do the other days."
Elsa, who has a food hygiene certificate, explained that the process of making vegan cakes is not hugely different to traditional cake-baking methods.
She uses oil or margarine instead of butter and soya milk instead of milk, but does not use an egg replacement.
"It's a myth about needing eggs," she said. "You just need to get the air into the mixture, have a hot oven and have everything ready to put it straight in the oven."
After sharing round some chilli-chocolate cup-cakes, Elsa said she wanted to change people's perception of vegan food as plain and boring.
She said: "They aren't healthy cakes - they are very indulgent! They taste just as good as non-vegan cakes! Nottingham is a great city for vegans, there are a lot of vegan shops - it's like the vegan capital of the UK."
When holding stalls, such as her regular spot at the Sumac Centre in Nottingham, Elsa dresses up in 1950s clothes and attracts customers with her brightly-decorated table and cakes.
"The look is important as well as the taste," she said.
Elsa is also running free workshops on how to make and decorate vegan cakes and cup-cakes on Saturday, March 15, from 2pm until 5pm.
The workshops will be held at the Sumac Centre, in Gladstone Street, Forest Fields, and Elsa advises that people will need to book in advance.
She is also hoping to find a business mentor to help her with Pop My Cherry as it begins to expand.
Born: December 22, 1981, in West Yorkshire.
Education: January 2007 - April 2007 Greentop Community Circus, Sheffield. Circus in Performance, OCN level 3: Static Trapeze, Equilibristics, Clowning.
September 2000 - June 2003 Nottingham Trent University. BA (Hons) Theatre Design, 2:1
September 1997 - June 2000 Leeds College of Art and Design. GNVQ in Art and Design, Art Foundation, A-levels in Italian, Film Studies and Art History.
September 1993 - June 1997 Instituto D'Arte di Sciacca. Maestro D-Arte, 15 GCSEs.
Career:
September 2007 - present Pop My Cherry, Nottingham.
January 2005 - present Co-founder of art and activist collective The Mischief Makers.
January 2004 - July 2007 Therapeutic art workshops leader across Nottingham.
Best business moment: "Doing the Vegan Festival and people from all over the country coming and buying my cakes.
"It was the first big thing I'd done and people thought I was really professional.
"People even asked to do work experience with me!
"The response I got was unbelievable."
Worst business moment: "Spending weeks making Valentine's Day cakes, putting them in tubs to deliver them, but going over too many bumps on my bike on the way.
"Not only had they squashed into each other but they had also turned completely upside down.
"They still sold though!"
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